DHAKA, May 25: As many as 380 children are still languishing in jails despite repeated High Court orders not to keep juveniles in prisons meant for adults, although three government-run juvenile development centres remain practically deserted with only 282 inmates against the capacity of 700.

The police have still been using various laws, including the repressive Special Powers Act of 1974, to put the alleged juvenile delinquents behind bars, though the children in conflict with the law are supposed to be dealt with only under the Children Act, 1974.

At the instruction of the national task force on juvenile justice, police headquarters ordered the law enforcers on August 7, 2006 not to arrest any juveniles under the Special Power Act 1974. Still, at least 97 children were arrested under the law in 2007.

According to a study done by Safe the Children UK, in 2007 a total of 1,532 children were sent to jails in Bangladesh. Of them 617 boys and 24 girls were detained under the Penal Code, 136 boys and 11 girls under the Code of Criminal Procedure, 95 boys and two girls under the Special Powers Act, 51 boys under the Arms Act, 98 boys and four girls under the Narcotics Control Act, 43 boys and one girl under the Speedy Trial Act, 135 boys and 110 girls under the Women and Children Repression Prevention Act, 21 boys under the Foreigners Act, and 149 boys and 35 girls were sent to jails under other laws.

Earlier, on April 9, 2003, a High Court bench of Justice Amirul Kabir Chowdhury and Justice Nijamul Haque Nasim delivered a verdict, detailing a seven-point directive for the government in this regard.

The court directed that no juvenile accused should be kept in jail and child inmates should be transferred to correction homes and other designated shelters from jails with utmost expedition.

The directives are yet to be implemented in their entirety, according to information available with the national task force on juvenile justice. The task force has representation of 27 government and non-government agencies.

As prisons witnessed a gradual increase in the number of juvenile inmates, the High Court on March 4, 2007 issued a fresh suo moto rule on the government to explain why necessary action should not be taken against it for keeping children in jails in violation of the High Court’s verdict delivered on April 9, 2003.

An official of the task force said, the number of children in jails increased by 42 in a month after the High Court issued a fresh order on March 4, 2007.